FL1 SHOES AND SPRINGS etc

Hello all.
After the hand brake kept sticking on ( not often) after coming through some wet stuff, but not very deep, third of a tyre.I wondered about a rear brake o/haul. last i did work on them I changed the wheel cylinder and lubed all the usual and renewed the hand brake cable,
The shoes had plenty on them, and its not been a problem at MOT time.
Just thinking whether it would be good practice to do the lot? or am I wasting money?
New shoes, and springs,
Any links for parts on this subject welcome.
Cheers all.

I had a leaking cylinder so decided to replace the whole lot - cylinders, shows, springs, clips, drums. Basically everything that bolts to the hub/back plate except the adjusters. It was an easy and surprisingly cheap exercise that has improved the brakes a lot.

I didn't replace hand brake cable or even need to adjust it afterwards - you may need to obviously, that's your call.

Most difficult bit was bleeding them afterwards - took a lot of bleeding - went round all 4 corners twice with a 'good bleed' each time to get them working well.

There's no salt put on roads over here, so the cylinders unbolted cleanly from the pipes, you may find that short pipes need replacing as well, which are probably more expensive than the rest of the job if you can't make them up yourself.

Mine's a '99, so I won't dig into the part numbers I used as your's is presumably the later set up.

Yes.. love this forum.
I'll do a search, but would love some parts experience.
Thanks.

MULDERKE said:

Just thinking whether it would be good practice to do the lot? or am I wasting money?
New shoes, and springs,
Any links for parts on this subject welcome.
Cheers all.

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Spending money and time on brakes is never a waste.
The shoes harden in time, and the drums wear, both reduce braking efficiency and cause sticking issues.

The rear brakes on the FL1 should be stripped, cleaned/replaced, reassembled and readjusted every year before the MOT.

Which reminds me, I've a new set of shoes to put on Ebay.

Thanks for your replies.
All good advice. Going to look at doing this then, but put it off a while for some spring weather. Don't want to start only to start snowing on me.

Cheers all.

Treat the snow and cold as air con!! If you work fast enough it cools you down!

MULDERKE said:

Thanks for your replies.
All good advice. Going to look at doing this then, but put it off a while for some spring weather. Don't want to start only to start snowing on me.

Cheers all.

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I'd be surprised if it snows anywhere other than the southeast, so southcentral and southwest should be snow free.

andyfreelandy said:

Treat the snow and cold as air con!! If you work fast enough it cools you down!

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Try telling my knees that Andy, after doing the daughter's gearbox last week!!

I could do with that lift of yours for the next job on my FL2, as I hate grovelling under cars to do things like diffs. It's so much easier when it's up in the air.

Nodge68 said:

I'd be surprised if it snows anywhere other than the southeast, so southcentral and southwest should be snow free.


Try telling my knees that Andy, after doing the daughter's gearbox last week!!

I could do with that lift of yours for the next job on my FL2, as I hate grovelling under cars to do things like diffs. It's so much easier when it's up in the air.

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I feel your pain brother, my knees are fracked from mountain biking crash(es) and are in absolute bits after that one day scrimmying about on the floor modifying the arms of the two poster at my workshop.

@MULDERKE - See your brakes, you can get a "fitting kit" relatively inexpensively on ebay that replaces most of the pins springs and clips, but you need to reuse the adjusters and most importantly the arm that I've highlighted in blue in this image:


The yellow part is what the cable end goes in, and is rivetted onto the blue arm, and should spin freely, however they do tend to stick. The adjusters are exxentially just a nut and bolt and clean up and grease up nicely, however the arm does tend to seize solid and is expensive. So on mine I soaked it in plus gas (gt85 or WD40 would also work) hammered an irwin bolt extractor...

...onto the rivet head on the underside of the arm, the points of the rifling bite into the lip of the domed rivet head, then I spun the bolt extractor with an impact gun, then kept spraying GT85 as I spun it into it to wash out the rust which freed up the rivet relative to the arm. I then gripped the hook in a vice and used the same procedure with the bolt extractor/impact gun/GT85 onto the rivet to free the rivet relative to the hook. It didn't take long, but really freed up that arm/hook nicely, if you don't have an impact gun, you could crack it with a breaker bar on the extractor and once it's free spin it with a cordless drill on the extractor, or just twirl it with a ratchet / sliding tee on the extractor¿ However, I've got to say it's worth putting a bit of effort into this part as it is the biggest culprit in rear breaks sticking.

PS: that image shows 2001 onwards part numbers and was "borrowed" from advanced factors website:
https://www.advancedfactors.co.uk/rear-brake-drums-shoes--cylinders-from-vin-1a000001-12865-c.asp

Jayridium said:

I feel your pain brother, my knees are fracked from mountain biking crash(es) and are in absolute bits after that one day scrimmying about on the floor modifying the arms of the two poster at my workshop

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I'd love a 2 poster, but unfortunately my silly low roof garage isn't suitable for one. I can't even get my Freelander in my garage, as the roof is too low.
So for the time being, I just have to suffer bad knees, but thankfully I don't need to do these sorts of jobs too often.

The garage at our house has coopted as a utility room, with all the white goods in there you couldn't get a vehicle in let alone work on it, which is why I have the workshop in an industrial unit, and having such a unit gives me the room, more specifically the height, to have the ramps. If I weren't able to keep the ramps I'd have to give up spannering :-(

Cheers all, As always.
Great info and help. It is tempting to dive in and strip down, but defiantly not as fast as was say 23-30 years ago. And defo not got the agility I used to have. very much so in the cold. The Garage is taken up with a right load of rubbish I rebuilt 30+ years ago.
Cheers

I approve your junk!

Oh memories!! I reshelled an MGB Roadster and sold it in 2018.
Leather, mohair, stainless exhaust, new loom.
If you Google WPT55L you'll see it.
Still got loads of MGB bits, pm me if you need anything.

Somewhere on here I read a brilliant tip for sorting sticking rear brakes.
I had rebuilt the rear brakes, new cylinders, shoes, drums and fitting kit. Thoroughly cleaned and checked all was ok. and still had issues. Then I saw someone say clean the contact point on the back plate.
The back plates have three flat spots where the shoes rub against the back plate. They get rust on them and stop the shoes easily sliding. I cleaned all the touch points with a flap disk and put a small amount of coppaslip at each point on assembly and the issue has cleared up.

6Sabre said:

Somewhere on here I read a brilliant tip for sorting sticking rear brakes.

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6Sabre said:

Then I saw someone say clean the contact point on the back plate.

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Was me, although I can't find where it was now. But yes cleaning and polishing the shoe standoffs and lubricating with copper grease will stop the shoes sticking.

Nodge68 said:

Was me, although I can't find where it was now. But yes cleaning and polishing the shoe standoffs and lubricating with copper grease will stop the shoes sticking.

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Thanks for that.